Follow up to "Worms Wanted": Thank you, semi-anonymous internet entities, Skornblith and Dorsalstream, for turning me on to the "tetris as eyeworm" meme. And these:
http://kottke.org/10/06/tetris-tetris-everywhere
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetris_effect
http://kottke.org/10/06/tetris-tetris-everywhere
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetris_effect
I think the idea of a non-aural x-worm is fascinating, and have been trying to think of one since your first post on the subject. I think the problem with the Tetrist Effect as being classified as an eye-worm is that its highly physiological, whereas musical earworms are highly conscious. The tetris effect is due to fairly low-level visual/perceptual processing becoming attenuated to movement– you get the same thing looking out a train window. As soon as you stop attending to the movement, it the effect quickly dissipates, and you can't call it back. On the other hand, earworms aren't directly triggered in the same way, and seem to exist separate from any perceptual attenuation. I can be stuck with an earworm inconsistently, over a long period of time. Will have to look to see if there is any neuroscience research on the phenomenon.
ReplyDeletedantekgeek: It's not just a matter of a motion aftereffect (which would be due to low-level visual/perceptual processing). It also gets into your hypnagogic hallucinations and dreams. See Stickgold et al., 2000, cited by the above Wikipedia article.
ReplyDeleteI do think dantekgeek has a finger on an interesting contrast, but it's difficult to spell out exactly what that contrast is. It seems important that earworms aren't just any old auditory phenomenon. They're melodies. And when they repeat in our ear that's us *doing* something (I'm tempted to here hijack Tenacious D's phrase "inward singing") in a way that seems not so straightforwardly to apply to the tetris effect.
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